Stressful Week with a Great Ending

This was a stressful week.  I won't dwell on it. But we got over it and now everything is great!!! :)

The whole week we struggled to get lessons, most days it seemed like everyone in gulu had their phone off. So that was a challenge to push through.

Tuesday was a good day. At night we taught a nice family. Their names are Geoffrey and Consy. They are very receptive and love all of the lessons. We were able to set a baptism date with both of them. That was exciting. They are so willing to be baptized. So they are now preparing for the 18 May. I seriously hope and pray that both of them progress together. It would be such a great experience to baptize a husband and wife together. They also have a brand new baby of about 4 weeks! So it might be hard to progress Consy but we will do our best.

Wednesday in the morning we had DDM (district development meeting). I organized some role-plays to help with weekly planning. It was great for the whole district and we learned a lot of things that we can do better with weekly planning. In the afternoon we went and taught Eve. She is preparing for baptism on the 4 May. She is doing great and loves the gospel. I cant remember if I already told you about her but she came to church 3 weeks ago and told us she just felt like coming. She had never been before and had never met the missionaries. and now we are preparing her for baptism! I love it when that happens.

Thursday was pretty rough. In the morning we had a full schedule of people appointments. We begin calling everyone to confirm appointments and NOBODY had their phone on. So we just had to go and wing it all day. At night we did get an awesome new investigator. We were walking to the Branch presidents house. Just before we got there this guy comes out of his house and calls for us. He starts talking and asking tons of questions about the church. He had been invited to FHE (family home evening) and Institute by the branch president a while back. So we went and sat down and taught him the Restoration and he was just super excited about all of it! He was definitely prepared to meet us. That was really fun to meet him. Oh yea haha his name is Peterson.

Church on Sunday was fantastic!! Our new Branch President is incredible. We had PEC at 8:30 in the morning and he started on time and didn't wait for others to show up. Then the church block meetings all went great. We had 72  in sacrament attendance and most were adults. In the past about half of the congregation were children. Now most of the kids don't come (most of them were strays from the road) and the congregation is mostly adults. After church we had the best Branch Council meeting I have ever been to in my life. The branch president did such a good job at keeping it organized and focused on things that the auxiliary leaders need to do to help the branch. So the branch is doing great.

 Mom and dad you are making me jealous that you are in Utah seeing everyone!!! I am stuck here in the middle of Africa.

I never expected to be getting a new cousin! Congrats Annelise. That was a huge surprise to read. Rick and Kathryn, Now we need some others to come along so they can all grow up the same age! hahahaha

I got my Easter box!! The candy is soo good! My companion liked his Easter basket/box thing too. Thanks so much! I have already finished most of it, with the help  of some other missionaries.

Why would you leave Joey and Sarah at home by themselves? I trust the dog more than them! Haha totally joking. :) Moose is a good babysitter.

If you need pics for my blog page then you will have 16 GB worth of pics from my card that the Hofheins have.

Me and elder Allred in our Lava-lavas! We got them from Elder Hofheins when he left. You can show it to them when you see him. 

This is the baptism a couple weeks ago. The one who baptized her is now the branch president. 

And then a sweet pic of a giraffe that I took! 

Love, Elder LeCheminant

Brad's Birthday and Easter

This week was also another one with ups and downs. Most of the week nobody was at home. It was really difficult to see all of our investigators. Nobody was at home and also everyone's phones were off. So both days we were just winging it and doing our best to get people at home. 

On Tuesday we taught an investigator called Geoffrey. we found him two weeks ago. Sunday we had given his family a copy of the Book Of Mormon. So Tuesday we went to talk about it. When we got there I asked what he had been able to read. He said he was at the part where Lehi dies. What?!?! I didn't believe it at first. But then he started telling us everything about Lehi's family in Jerusalem and how they left, then built a boat, then went to America, then the split of Nephites and Lamanites. I was so surprised. Wait its not over!! We sat there for a while talking about everything, then at the end, right before we were about to leave, he confessed that he had only read the chapter headings for 1st Nephi up until 2 Nephi where Lehi dies. Haha, I just laughed and laughed and laughed. He totally got us! 

Wednesday we taught a lady called Eve. She came to church a couple weeks ago just randomly. She said she had never been before and she never met the missionaries. She just felt like she needed to come and see the church. So we have been teaching her. On Wednesday we taught her the Plan of Salvation. Then at the end I asked her if she had any questions. Then she said "When are you going to baptize me?" Haha I love it when people ask us to be baptized instead of us asking them. She is progressing very very well and now has a Baptism date for the first week of May. 

Thursday was of course my birfday. Yea not to exciting. I made my box of mac and cheese for lunch. And I mixed some of mom's canned salmon in it as well. Then at night after everyone was back, Sister Moore, the senior couple, made an incredible chocolate cake with chocolate icing. Oh my goodness it was soo good! Yay now I am 20. Woo hoo. Thanks mom for the box :)

Friday we had weekly planning then as we were just about to leave to go out and work, the APs showed up; so then we got to work with one for the day. We had a great time. They came up for our Zone Conference on Saturday. 

It was a pretty dang awesome conference. I love President Chatfield. After Zone Conference we had an amazing lunch made by Elder and Sister Moore, our senior couple here. She made this pasta goulash kinda thing. As mom knows thats like my favorite food ever! She also made some amazing garlic bread and banana squares. I almost died. Then later after we headed out to work we stopped at the church to try and find a member to work with. No one was there except for President Chatfield; he was there doing interviews for the Branches. When we arrived he had no one and was just waiting. So we went and talked to him. It was fun. We were telling all of our hunting and snowmachining stories. I enjoyed it a lot. He is the best mission President ever. 

Sunday was great! It didnt really feel like Easter, but it was good to think a little more about the Atonement. Church was awesome! President Chatfield and the APs came to our Branch. He was there to reorganize the Branch Presidency. Now we have a new branch president. I am really excited because he is an awesome guy and is going to do wonders for the Branch. So that was a fun experience.  There's the week!

I just emailed Elder Hofheins. He replied right away and he said he is going to call you (mom) today to talk about when you all can meet up. He told me something about wanting to have you all over at his house for some dinner. So you can talk to him and figure all that shtuff out. I gave him your phone numba. 

Jacob you're crazy! Stop trying to break the by-side-by-side! hahaha

Mom - So I don't know if I am just crazy or what, but I thought that I saw some replacement heads for my shaver in my box when I opened it. But the day after I was going through it and didnt see them anywhere. So I decided that either someone took them from the box or I am just crazy and they were never there in the first place or I am crazy and somehow misplaced them. I asked all of the Elders if they took it, and of course no one had any idea what I was talking about and everyone acted completely innocent. So I hate to ask for another one, but if you could send another one along with some real shaving cream. I bought some but it kinda stinks. Thanks mom! Your awesome ;) Now I am a lot more careful with the things that are in my packages. Everything else in the box survived. The canned salmon is amazing! I want more!!! hahaha :)

I predict that joey is going to the Boise Idaho Mission! 

Haha kissing is a great way to spread sickness around! I hope everyone in the play at the school stays healthy. There's nothing worse than trying to perform and being sick at the same time. And why are the plays always so crazy? Nothing can beat the ones that I was in. hahahaha :)

Have a great week everyone. Congrats to Lindsey and Andy for graduating this week! Oh yea, what is the name of the blog that Lindsey made for me? I was going through my emails and couldn't find it. 

Love Elder LeCheminant

The Shortest Email Ever

This week was a good week. This is going to be short because the power went out and I have very small time remaining.

Every day this week was full of solid teaching and good work. This week was kinda a week full of small trials mixed with blessings. It was really hard to get used to some things but now we are doing great. Also, as we were working, trials would just start piling up. We just pushed through and did our best then the lord blessed us. That happened several times. Piles of trials then one small thing the lord blesses us with. It was actually kinda cool to be able to recognize the hand of the lord in what we were doing.

On Thursday in the morning we spent about 5 hours working in a garden. We were planting maize and g-nuts. G-nuts are like peanuts but grow in the ground. They are really good. So that was a great experience.
On Friday I did 1 interview for my district and on Saturday I did 2 interviews for the ZL's. They were all successful. On Sunday we also had a baptism. Her name is Cynthia. She is the daughter to Patrick and Jackie who we baptized last transfer. It was a good baptism.

After church yesterday I made everyone caramel syrup and pancakes. It was AMAZING! The caramel syrup actually turned out right and it was artery clogging/heart attack kind of deliciousness.

I will get whatever mail comes at the end of the month! Oh yea, i mailed the pfd form. I tried to do it express but it was going to cost WAAAYYY too much. Express for just a small letter is 86,000 shillings. Normal postage is 3,400 shillings. So yea I didnt want to spend that much money so I sent it regular postage. So I dont know how long it will take to get there.

Have you got the postcard that I sent? Just wondering.

Its my Bday this week! Just in case any of you forgot :)

Yea this is prob my shortest email ever!!!!!!!
Have a good week
Elder LeCheminant

Companion-less Designated Driver

Transfer week is always crazy. This was an especially crazy one.
So basically all day Tuesday was spent going around with Elder Phiri and Hofheins so they could say goodbye to people. That was an adventure. Then They left on Wednesday in the morning at like 6:00 to go to Kampala.

So all 4 of us missionaries here in Gulu were left with no companion. Also the truck was left here. Normally the ZL's are the only ones allowed to drive. But Elder Hofheins was gone and the other ZL doesn't have a license in Uganda. So that left me as the designated driver. I was driving all day on Wednesday. Since all 4 of us had no companion we basically just spent the day bouncing around all 4 areas for the whole day. That was super exciting. Then on Thursday I got to drive to a place called Kamdini. Its basically the split on the road north where you go straight and go to Gulu or you turn and go to Lira. The Lira Senior couple brought up one Elder for us in Gulu; so I got to drive to Kamdini to pick him up. The other three came with our Gulu senior couple on Friday. The drive to Kamdini was fun. It takes about an hour. The road is terrible though and full of huge potholes and crazy drivers. The truck was a blast to drive. Here we drive on the right side of the car and on the left side of the road. And our truck is a manual transmission. Soo haha to Andy! You cant tell me I cant drive stick :)

Anyways, my new comp finally came on Friday. Three days with no companion kinda sucked. I'm happy he is here. He is Elder Mukengeshayi. He is from Kinshasa DRCongo. He speaks French and he is 8 months on his mission now. When he first came he didn't know any English. He is still learning English so communication is a challenge at some points. We have to do English language study everyday; so this is an interesting change. He is a good person though and wants to work hard.

Saturday and Sunday we just spent our time going around visiting people. I was mostly just showing him around the area and letting him get to know our people. This is going to be an interesting transfer. But I feel like we are going to have a good time.

Mom I got the package! It came up with the transfers. Thanks a bunch. I am only a teenager for like 2 more weeks. What?!
Today I ran out of shaving cream. SO Idk what Im gonna do now. I will try to find some at a supermarket here but it most likely will not be very good.

I sent my SD card completely filled with pics with Elder Hofheins. I gave him mom and dads cell phone numbas so he should be calling you at some point.

I cant wait until we get Conference DVD's in a couple weeks! It seems lilke it was a good conference.

I also just looked at the google+ thingy. It looks pretty cool but new. I will try uploading pics to that sometime and see how it works.

Have a good week!
Love Elder LeCheminant